As If It Weren't Still Fresh
by BellatrixLestrangey
Summary: Azula Week Day 1: Tattoo Shop AU. Azula is a tattoo artist and Chan is her anxious client.


"Will you hold still." Azula snaps, drawing the tattoo gun away for a fourth time.

"Sorry." Chan mumbles.

For all of his muscles and that inflated ego of his, the boy is something of a wimp. It has been a half an hour and she has scarcely made any progress on the man's ink. "Do you want your tiger or not?"

"I want it!" He insists.

"Then let me do my job." Azula grumbles. She has had some difficult clients before, but none of them have given her as much of a hassle as Chan. She gives him a moment to take a drink of his mango slushie before bringing the tattoo gun back to his arm. She tries to ignore his whimpers and focus on the whirring buzz of her equipment.

"I should have brought Ruon along with me." He mumbles glumly.

Azula gives a haughty half-snort. "You're lucky that you didn't, if you're a fan of your dignity."

"Do you talk to all of your clients like this!?" Chan asks.

Azula thinks for a moment, "nope, just you."

Chan winces again. She thinks that he may pass out, she supposes that she should try to distract him. So she humors him when he inquires, "so what is the daughter of a multi-million dollar CEO doing in a place like this?"

"It's a hobby." She replies.

"Some hobby." Chan says. "How'd you find it?"

Azula thinks back. "I had...I had a phase." She doesn't particularly wish to discuss the era of her life that landed her in an institute.

"What kind of phase? The drug kind?"

Azula crinkles her nose. "No. I like to keep myself in good health." She pauses before momentarily withdrawing the tattoo gun to pull up her sleeve. She lets Chan stare at a dragon of ink positioned to look like it is ripping scars into her skin. After a moment she resumes her work.

"Oh…" trails off.

"It isn't a big deal." Azula shrugs with her free arm.

"You hurt yourself." He comments.

"Yes." She says. "I did a lot of things to get my father to come home. Mai and I stole a car once."

"How'd that go?"

"Successfully, actually." Azula half-smirks. "Until Michi found out. Doesn't let Mai talk to me much anymore." Back then they were a duo; Mai's mother couldn't be bothered to spare her a thought and Azula's father neglected her. The chaos they stirred together had been the sort that couldn't be ignored. "I found someone else though."

"Did that someone introduce you to tattoos?"

"She gave me my first." Azula nods. She almost has the outline done. She looks at the sleeve of tattoos on her own arm. Offering Chan a needed break, she points to the band of blue fire towards the middle of the sleeve. "It started out with just that one and grew from there."

"I take it your dad doesn't approve."

"He doesn't care either way around." Azula mutters. "That's fine, Ty likes them."

"So who'd you give your first tattoo to?"

This time her smirk is more or less full. "Zuzu. He wanted a dragon." She thinks that it turned out will for her first job. She wouldn't settle for anything that was subpar. Which is exactly why she had touched the thing up later after learning a trick or two about proper shading techniques. "It's an art Chan. People don't appreciate it. They think tattoos are trashy and rebellious. But they are profound, they have meaning." She pauses. "And the artwork has to be perfect because a person will wear it forever. I only want my best work out there...so for the fuck's sake, sit still!"

"Sorry!" He cringes.

She is exchanging a deep black ink for a vivid, marigold orange when she hears the bell chime. "Hey." June greets, walking into the shop. She flicks the remains of her ciggeret into the nearest ashtray.

"How was your smoke break?" She doesn't look up from Chan's bicep.

"Same old, same old. Had to put," she wriggles her fingers for pazzaze, "The Boulder," she puts her arms down, "in his place. That man thinks he's a charmer. I swear…" She tugs her jacket, all leather and studs, and tosses it over her chair. "Whatcha workin' on."

Azula makes room for June to steal a peek. "Chan, this is June. She co-owns this shop with me and introduced me to the art."

"Hi, I'm Chan." He smiles weakly. He hisses in pain.

"I see you've got yourself a tattoo virgin." June comments.

Azula rolls her eyes. "I have a feeling that he'll flinch just as much the second time around." And to Chan she informs, "relax, we're almost done and then you can go lie about how it didn't hurt at all."

"Why am I friends with you?" She hears him murmur.

She draws a final line of ink and turns the gun off. She wraps his arm in a bandage with instructions to remove it after at least two hours. She presses a small pouch into his hand. "Clean it and apply the ointment at least twice a day. I recommend three times."

Chan nods.

"And, please, don't pull a Zuko and pick at the scabs."

June laughs. "Oh man, that was a fun sight."

Azula sends Chan on his way and takes a seat, near June, picking through the lunch she'd packed. It will be another hour before Jet makes his way in. "You do any interesting work lately?"

"Some girl came in wanting a pretty badass Kyoshi tattoo."

Azula continues the small talk. It is good for her, it brings her a sense of normalcy. On most days she can pretend that she hadn't just finished patching together the remaining tatters of her life. She had spoken to Chan as if that era of her life ended months back.

She had spoken to him as if the ink on her wrist isn't still fresh.


End file.
